


The Ghost of You

by the_savage_daughter_0627



Series: Hauntober 2020 [6]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern: No Powers, Character Death, Character Turned Into a Ghost, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Haunting, Hurt Zuko (Avatar), I Don't Even Know, I'm Bad At Summaries, I'm Going to Hell, I'm Sorry, Inspired by Avatar: The Last Airbender, Iroh (Avatar) is a Good Uncle, Jet (Avatar) Lives, Katara (Avatar)-centric, Long, Minor Mai/Zuko, October Prompt Challenge, One Shot, POV Zuko (Avatar), Protective Sokka (Avatar), Protective Zuko (Avatar), Sad, Sad with a Happy Ending, Sane Azula (Avatar), Tragedy, Tragic Romance, Tumblr Prompt, Zuko (Avatar)-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:33:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27277297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_savage_daughter_0627/pseuds/the_savage_daughter_0627
Summary: The hardest part of dying is learning to let go.Written for the Hauntober 2020 prompt "Ghost"
Relationships: Jet/Katara (Avatar), Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Suki (Avatar)
Series: Hauntober 2020 [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1973365
Comments: 50
Kudos: 69





	The Ghost of You

**Author's Note:**

> I do not know what possessed me to write this fic. It's really, really sad, so if you wanna cry, you should read it. If you don't, then...don't read it. This fic makes me Big Sad.
> 
> I'm sorry to my beta, FireLadyFae/LadyFaePhillips, for putting you through this.
> 
> This will be my last entry to Hauntober 2020.

It is a pop, like a bursting balloon. One minute, Zuko is walking down the sidewalk. The next, _pop_.

Now he is standing over a body lying in the street. There is screaming and movement all around him. A crowd has gathered next to the body. Three people kneel down beside it. One is pressing on the person’s chest as crimson blooms across the white cotton shirt. Another is breathing into the person’s mouth. The third is talking on their cell phone. 

“—shots fired at 133rd and Division Street. Someone’s been shot—”

And Zuko is just standing there, watching the scene unfold. He doesn’t remember how he got here, and why isn’t he doing anything to help? He’s a paramedic; he knows how to triage a bullet wound. 

“EMT, let me through,” Zuko says as he steps closer to the body.

But no one moves. No one looks up at him. No one even _acknowledges_ him. 

“Hey, watch out!” 

Zuko moves until he stands just beyond the woman performing CPR. She pulls back, turning towards the others nearby, and Zuko gets a closer look at the person lying on the ground. When he sees the body, he feels cold terror seep into him.

The body on the ground is _his own._

* * *

  
  


He’s dead. He’s been _shot._ Zuko can’t quite remember how that happened and what has led him here. 

He had been walking towards that little Chinese restaurant down the street from the apartment he shares with his girlfriend, Katara. She’d had a long night at the ER the night before. The graveyard shift was hard on her. When she’d woken up she had a throbbing headache and was spiraling into one of her panics, wondering if she had made a mistake, if she had chosen the wrong career. 

Zuko had calmed her down, and offered to get her favorite food for dinner. He’d left, putting in his headphones. Everything had been fine.

Now he stands over his own body at the intersection of 133rd and Division. Sirens scream in the distance. A crowd has gathered around, gawking at the blood and the body. People are drawn to tragedy like a moth to the light. 

The people who had been trying to help him have given up. He’s gone. Someone had laid a jacket over his face, and Zuko is grateful for that. It’s unnerving to see himself there, limp and unmoving. 

A moment later the ambulance arrives. Paramedics pour out, carrying triage bags, and immediately get to work assessing Zuko’s condition.

_Don’t bother,_ he thinks, strangely calm. _I’m dead._

The EMT checks his pulse. He looks back up at the others and shakes his head. “DOA,” he announces. 

Two cop cars pull up next, one a standard patrol car and the other an unmarked sedan. Zuko watches the detectives that step out of the plain car and walk up to the EMTs and survey the body. They look grim, but Zuko knows this is just another day on the job for them. How many times had he responded to a similar call?

An untold amount of time passes as Zuko watches the scene before him. No one else seems to notice him, but he hangs back anyway as he tries to make sense of what has happened. If it wasn’t for his own body lying still on the pavement with a gunshot wound to the chest, he probably wouldn’t believe it. But there is no other explanation. He’s truly dead.

CSU shows up, and then more cops. Witnesses are interviewed. Crime scene tape is strung up while the uniforms enact crowd control. CSU technicians go around collecting evidence, snapping photos, and setting up little yellow markers to dictate the scene. 

One of the cops, a detective by the look of him, who couldn’t have been much older than Zuko was, goes to the body and fishes around in his pockets for a moment. 

Zuko bristles momentarily at the motion, but he has to remember, he’s dead now. It’s not like he needs money. The detective produces Zuko’s wallet and opens it.

“Vic’s name is Zuko Sozin.” The detective stands up and looks down the street, toward Zuko’s apartment. His expression is hard. “He lives just a couple of blocks away. I’ll go see if anyone is home...notify the family.”

Zuko swallows hard. _Katara._ She’ll be waiting for him, curled up on the couch in her fuzzy whale-print pajama bottoms as she catches up on her favorite shows. She might already be wondering where he is. Zuko would bet that if he checked his phone, there would be missed calls and texts from her.

Did she hear the sirens and wonder if something had happened to him? No, if anything, Katara would have assumed that he had stopped to help. Never would she think that something had happened to him. 

The detective flags down his partner, a dark-haired woman with a serious countenance, and they head for his patrol car. 

“Hey, wait!” But the detectives don’t hear him. Of course not. Because he’s not really there anymore. But...isn’t he? No one can see him. No one can hear him. He is a ghost.

But he doesn’t have time to contemplate his new existence. Zuko hurries over to the unmarked car and reaches for the handle on the back door, but to his surprise, his hand ghosts through it and into the car’s interior. He gasps and stares at his hand on the other side in disbelief. 

But the car has already started and is getting ready to move, so he bites back his shock.

“Screw it,” he mutters, and slides the rest of his body through the door.

Zuko doesn’t quite understand how he could go through a door but not fall through the seat of the car, but at that moment, he doesn’t care. He can puzzle over the rules of his new existence later. Right now, all he can think about is Katara as they drive down the street towards his apartment.

A few minutes later they’re pulling up outside, and Zuko glides through the door again as the detectives climb out and start for the door. 

Zuko passes through the door and into the building. He looks up at the stairs. There, on the third floor, Katara is waiting for him. He knows that when those detectives knock on their door, her world will shatter. 

He blinks.

_Pop._

Suddenly, he’s standing in the foyer of the apartment. Katara is still sitting on the couch, holding a mug of tea in her hands while she watches TV. Her hair, which she had braided before she went to bed that morning, has come mostly undone and spills across her shoulders in an unruly wave. Her phone rests on the arm of the couch, and he watches as she grabs it and checks it.

“Come on, Zuko. Where are you?” Her brow is furrowed as she says it, and Zuko goes over to her, his heart pulling painfully in his chest. 

But the sensation isn’t quite right, because he doesn’t really _have_ a heart anymore. But that place where it used to be, it still feels his pain.

“I’m right here,” he says despondently. 

Then there’s a knock at the door. The detectives have arrived.

Katara looks up, her frown deepening. She sets her phone down and peels herself off of the couch, placing her mug on the table. Katara wraps the throw blanket that had been on her lap around her shoulders and smooths down her hair as she goes to the door. 

Zuko trails helplessly after her. She can’t see him. She can’t hear him. He can’t prepare her for the news she is about to receive. He can offer her no comfort or reassurances. And that hurts him deeper than the bullet that has taken his life.

Katara opens the door. The two detectives stand soberly on the other side. Zuko goes and stands beside her, his eyes trained on her face, willing her to see him. But she is completely oblivious.

“Can I help you?” Katara asks, clearly confused.

The male detective holds up his badge. “I’m Detective Jet Lang. This is my partner, Detective June Soto. Does Zuko Sozin live here?” 

Zuko watches her brow crease again. The confusion is clear in her eyes, and his heart twinges painfully again. The bad news is coming. It’s like watching a plane crash; he knows it’s going to happen and he’s powerless to stop it.

“Yes,” Katara answers slowly. “Is everything okay?”

“Do you mind if we come in, ma’am?” Detective Lang asks. 

“Can you tell me what’s going on?” But even as she asks, she’s stepping aside and letting the detectives in.

They brush through Zuko, and for a moment the world around him wavers as a peculiar buzzing sensation fills him. He steps back, away from them, and the world stills. He shakes his head to clear away the last of the buzzing. He watches as Katara shuts the door behind the detectives and turns back to them, wrapping herself tighter in the blanket. 

The small lines that form between her eyebrows when she frowns have appeared. Zuko has always loved those lines, and whenever they appear, he’s always trying his best to make them go away. Now, he is utterly powerless to do anything about them. 

“Has something happened?” 

He can see it in her face that she suspects something is wrong. Katara is doing her residency in an emergency room on the poor side of town. She sees victims of horrible crimes all the time come into her ER. Doubtlessly, she has been the one to deliver the same sort of news she’s about to receive. She knows the look on the detectives’ faces, because it has been mirrored in her own before. 

“What’s your name, miss?” Detective Lang asks her.

Zuko watches the way her throat moves as she swallows. She’s waiting for the news, but she has no idea what it is. “Katara.”

“What’s your relationship with Mr. Sozin?” Detective Soto asks gently.

Katara’s eyes flicker to her. Zuko can tell that she is becoming more worried with the way the detectives aren’t answering her questions. Zuko reaches out for her, but his fingers pass through her shoulder uselessly. 

“He’s my boyfriend. We live here together,” Katara answers. “Now please tell me, what’s going on? Is he okay?” Her eyes grow glassy with unshed tears.

Detective Lang takes a step closer to her, his face molded into an expression of empathy. “I’m sorry to inform you of this, Katara, but...he was killed in an apparent drive-by shooting.” 

Shock breaks out across her face, her blue eyes widening as her jaw drops open. Then her expression twists as the tears that had welled up in her eyes spill down her cheeks. 

“No,” Katara moans, bringing her hand to her mouth. “No, no, there’s no way. He was just-he just went to get us something for dinner. There has to be some kind of mistake—”

“We’re sorry, miss,” Detective Soto says sympathetically. “We found his ID on the body. It’s him.”

A terrible, broken sound leaves Katara. Her legs give out and she falls back against the wall of the foyer, burying her face in her hands as her grief shakes her. The detectives politely avert their eyes, looking sympathetic. 

“No, no, _nonono_ ,” Katara sobs. “It can’t be—it can’t be true. It just can’t be…he’s supposed to be coming home...he’s coming home...”

Zuko’s face crumples with grief at her pain, and he reaches out for her again. But just like before, his hand brushes through her. He realizes then that he can’t cry anymore, not in this new form, but if he could, he would be. 

Helplessly, he watches Katara’s heart break.

* * *

  
  


Minutes pass. The detectives wait until Katara has her emotions mostly under control before they interview her briefly. 

Zuko thinks that she has always worked well under pressure, and she’s able to sit through their questions—why he was there (“he went to get dinner from Miyuki’s”), did anyone want to hurt him (“no, everyone loves him”), was there any possible chance that he was the target (“of a drive-by? No, no way.”). 

Zuko learns there was one other victim, who had been taken to the hospital. In all the flurry of activity around his body (and of course, coming to the realization that he is _dead_ ), Zuko hadn’t noticed anyone else. 

They ask her if there’s anyone she can call. She nods and mentions her brother. Detective Lang gives her his card and tells her to call him if she thinks of anything else, or if she needs anything. 

Then the detectives go, and it’s just him and Katara in the apartment. But of course, it’s really only her. He’s just a ghost. 

Once they’re gone, Katara loses her thin grasp on her emotions and she gives herself to her grief. She curls into a ball on the couch and sobs into the cushion, her body shaking with the force of her sorrow.

Zuko knows she can’t see him, can’t feel him, but he still goes to her. He kneels down beside her and tries to touch her, _willing_ himself to touch her skin and wipe her tears away, but his hands ghost through her and he shouts in frustration and grief. 

“Why me?” he shouts into the apartment. His eyes fall on Katara and his emotions swell up again. “Why _her?_ ” 

He doesn’t know, and Zuko doesn’t think he’ll ever have an answer. Bad things happen all of the time. He just never expected something this bad to happen to him.

It’s almost ten pm when Katara composes herself to call in to work. She sits on the couch, her eyes glassy and her cheeks red and blotchy while she makes the first call. 

Zuko sits beside her while she calls her boss down at the hospital. It doesn’t really make sense to Zuko. Why would she call work first? But he knows that grief isn’t always rational, and this is how it’s manifesting in her. 

She holds herself together until the call is over, but then more tears pour down her face and she cradles her head in her hands. He tries to rub soothing circles on her back, but he can’t touch her. 

Zuko thinks that might be the worst part about this. Death is a fact of life. But this...this limbo, where he is a ghost but yet he is still _here_ , watching the love of his life suffer and not being able to do a damn thing about it? It’s agony. It’s worse than dying. 

“Call Sokka, babe,” Zuko whispers. “Call Suki or Toph or anybody. You shouldn’t be alone. You shouldn’t be…” 

He trails off and shakes his head, but he finishes the thought in his mind: _you shouldn’t be dealing with this._

He only vaguely remembers the last few minutes of his living life. He remembers walking down the street, passing in front of the corner market as he went towards the last intersection before he got to Miyuki’s. Standing at the crosswalk. And then...nothing.

Pop.

And he’s standing above his own body. He remembers nothing of the shooting itself, and he finds that he doesn’t really care about that. In fact, it’s probably for the best. To not remember his last fleeting moments, what thoughts might have run through his head…

But this...this is cruel. _Is this what happens after death? You become a ghost and get to watch your loved ones suffer? Why? What’s the point?_ Zuko wonders angrily. 

Zuko watches the tears run down her cheeks. He wants to wipe them away, but instead he curls his hands into fists. He’s furious. He’s angry that he can’t do anything to help ease Katara’s pain. He’s mad at the injustice of it all, that he was just some innocent bystander, wrong place, wrong time, _bang_ , and his life is over.

And there was so much _promise_ for his life. Katara is almost finished with her residency. Zuko had been shopping for rings and was planning to propose to her. They had their future mapped out: a dog, children, a white picket fence all down the line. And now it’s all been ripped away by a bullet, and there is nothing Zuko can do about it.

Katara releases a shaky breath and picks up her phone again. Zuko watches her apprehensively, wondering what she’s going to do next. The words are on the tip of his tongue: _what are you doing? Are you going to call Sokka?_ But there’s no use in speaking them. Katara can’t hear them.

Then she taps at her phone screen and presses it against her ear. She draws her knees up to her chest and rocks slightly, her eyes staring blankly ahead as more tears slip down her face. 

Zuko hears Sokka’s voice come over the phone. “Hey, Katara, what’s up? Shouldn’t you be going to work?”

Her mouth opens, and for a moment nothing comes out but a strangled gasp. Katara continues to stare blankly ahead of her. Zuko reaches out for her. He lets his hand linger just above her cheek. He can _almost_ feel her. 

But almost is not nearly enough.

“Katara?” Sokka prompts, an edge of panic in his voice.

“ _Sokka_.” Katara breaks again, her face crumpling. She presses her fist to her mouth as a keening sob leaves her. 

Over the sounds of her grief, Zuko can hear Sokka: “Katara, what’s going on? Are you okay? Talk to me. Hey, come on, what’s going on?”

Katara manages to find her voice. “Oh spirits, Sokka, he’s dead, he’s gone, he’s _dead_ —” Her cries come harder and drown out Sokka’s voice. 

Zuko watches helplessly. He would give anything to be able to hold her, to offer her comfort. 

He settles for holding his hand just above hers. It’s almost like he’s able to touch her, and it seems like that’s all he’ll ever be able to do.

* * *

_Nothing is worse than this_ , Zuko thinks to himself over the next several days. All he can do is watch as Katara struggles to accept her new reality. 

Sokka comes by that first night, and he stays with her and takes care of her. Zuko has never appreciated his girlfriend’s brother as much as he does that night.

The next day, Sokka and Katara begin to make phone calls. Calls to their friends, his uncle, his job, the police, the funeral home. 

The fact that they aren’t married complicates things, he gleans from the conversation with the funeral home. She has no legal right to make decisions. It has to be done through next of kin, either by children, spouses, parents, or siblings. And that backs Katara into a corner, one that Zuko wishes she never had to face.

She makes the call to his sister, and Zuko stands nearby, listening to every word. 

He’s never had the best relationship with his family, and once he was eighteen, he had moved far away from them and cut off contact with everyone but his uncle. Over time, he started speaking to Azula again, but only in a limited capacity. 

They’ve never even met Katara. He wonders if his sister and father will fly out for the funeral, or if they’ll make all of the arrangements from the Fire Nation.

Later that day, their friends come over. Suki, Toph, and Aang bring comfort foods. They sit in the living room and offer words of sympathy, and Katara mostly holds on to her brave face. 

She has always been so strong, but Zuko knows her better than anyone else. He can see the way that she’s breaking. 

Then everyone leaves, and it’s just him and Katara. For a while she sits in the dark living room, chewing her nails down to the quick like she does when she’s nervous or worried or anxious. 

Zuko sits down beside her and he talks to her even though she can’t hear him.

“I’m so sorry you’re going through this. This never should have happened. I wish you could hear me, I wish you could see me. I’m right _here_.” He reaches out for her, his fingertips grazing over her cheek. His face crumples. “I’m right here...I love you.”

* * *

  
  


Never in his life did Zuko imagine attending his own funeral. But he sits in the back row, watching as friends and colleagues file into the room and go up to the golden urn on its podium to pay their respects to him. 

There are more people than he ever could have expected, and in a way, it warms him. His life meant something. 

He even sees a few unexpected faces: people he has helped over the years as a paramedic, including the family with the young girl he had saved from choking to death. 

But his heart shatters when he sees his uncle come into the room. Iroh’s skin is pale and his eyes are red-rimmed from his tears, but he keeps his face stoic as he goes up to the urn and says a silent prayer. 

Zuko finds himself pulled towards his uncle, the first person to love him, to believe in him. He follows him as Iroh leaves the urn and goes to where Katara sits with her brother and their friends. 

Iroh has always liked Katara. He has always encouraged Zuko in his relationship with her, offering advice whenever they got into a disagreement or if Zuko needed an opinion on a gift or date idea. He’s the only one who knows Zuko was going to propose.

She stands up. She looks so beautiful and tragic in her black dress. The dark colors make her eyes seem brighter than usual. Zuko wishes he could take the sadness from her eyes. But he can’t. Spirits, he knows he can’t and he’s never been so frustrated in his life. 

“I’m so sorry, Iroh,” Katara says, her voice just above a whisper. 

“Me too,” Iroh chokes out. He smiles at her and a single tear rolls down his cheek.

He wraps Katara into a hug, and for a moment they cling to each other, as if their embrace is the only thing keeping them from falling apart. When they pull away, their cheeks are damp. 

Then Iroh’s gaze is drawn to the back of the room. Zuko looks, and he sees his sister has come in. She’s dressed in black and she isn’t alone.

But it’s not his father with her. It’s Mai. 

Zuko stares as the two walk up to the urn. Mai hangs her head as Azula lays a single rose at the base of the urn. 

Zuko knows that if he was still in an actual body, a lump would be rising in his throat. He can’t believe Azula is here. And Mai, too. He hasn’t seen her in years, since he left home and broke things off with her.

They go to where Iroh and Katara are still standing, having watched them enter. Iroh puts his hand on Azula’s shoulder.

“Father couldn’t make it,” she says, and there’s a bite to her words that Zuko knows all too well. It’s not that his father couldn’t make it; he just didn’t want to. He didn’t care.

Somehow, Zuko isn’t surprised. But it still hurts.

The funeral proceeds. Zuko knows that Azula and Katara have worked together to get it set up, and really, it’s nice. People share memories and stories of him. Tears are shed. Words of condolence are offered to Katara, Azula, and Iroh.

Sokka and Suki offer to stay, to take her home and keep her company, but Katara tells them she’ll be fine. They try to insist, but she shakes them off, saying she just wants to be alone. Reluctantly, they go, but not before they have her promise to call them if she needs them.

Then only Iroh, Azula, Mai, and Katara remain. Along with his ashes in the golden urn. 

Azula has covered her tears with makeup, but Zuko can see the sadness in her eyes. Mai, too, although the redness of her eyes reveals her tears.

Katara reaches into her purse and pulls out a small capsule. She presses it into Azula’s hand as fresh tears run down her cheeks.

“This is for you,” Katara says. “Zuko always talked about this pond your mother would take both of you to when he was a child, to feed the turtleducks. I thought you might like to spread some of his ashes there.”

Zuko watches in shock as a single tear rolls down Azula’s cheek. She holds the small container to her heart.

“My brother and I haven’t always had the best relationship,” she murmurs as she wipes the tear away. “But I really did love him. Thank you.”

Then Azula and Mai leave. Katara picks up the urn, and she and Iroh walk out together. Zuko follows after them. Iroh walks her to her car.

“If you need anything, please don’t hesitate to call me,” Iroh tells her as he pulls her into another embrace. “I’ve treated Zuko as if he were my own son since he was a boy. And I’ve come to look at you like a daughter. I’ll always be here for you. Please...do not forget that, Katara”

She pulls away slowly. For a moment, Katara seems unable to speak. She nods and wipes away her tears.

“Thank you,” she whispers. 

Then she gets into her car. Zuko slips through the door and they go back to the apartment. Katara carries the urn upstairs, cradling it delicately in her arms. She sets it on the coffee table and goes to the bathroom. 

Zuko trails after her, feeling lost and heartbroken. She turns on music, and a familiar song begins to play as she unzips her funeral dress. It’s _their_ song, the one that was playing when he kissed her for the first time, the one they danced to in the kitchen just a few days before he died. 

“Katara, don’t do this to yourself,” Zuko says brokenly to her.

She runs a bath and gets in, sinking up to her neck and closing her eyes. Zuko sits on the floor beside the tub. 

She cries while their song plays on repeat, and all he can do is sit there, wishing he could let her know that he is still here, _right here_ , and he will always, always love her.

That night, she brings the urn into their bedroom. She sits it on her bedside table and gets under the covers. She takes his pillow and brings it to her chest, and she talks to him.

“I miss you so much, Zuko,” she says to the urn. Zuko is standing by the bed, and it’s _almost_ like she’s talking to him. “This isn’t fair. It’s not _right_. You didn’t deserve to go like that. You were so kind and wonderful and amazing. The world needs people like you. Why did this happen?”

She gets lost in her grief, and he loses himself right along with her.

* * *

The detectives come by a few days later. They found the shooter and arrested him. He was targeting the other victim, who was recovering in the hospital. Zuko was just an innocent bystander. Wrong place, wrong time.

Katara thanks the detectives, but when they’re gone, she picks up the water glass she’s been drinking from and throws it at the wall. It shatters into hundreds of tiny pieces as she screams into the empty apartment.

There is no justice. Zuko is still dead. Nothing will change that. 

* * *

The days turn into weeks. Eventually, her tears come less often and she goes back to work. Life goes on, but Zuko is still here.

He doesn’t know what to make of it. Is this the afterlife? This horrible limbo where he watches his loved ones grieve him and slowly pick up the pieces? Invisible, unable to be heard. Is this what his existence will be from now on? 

Maybe it’s because his life was cut off so drastically. Maybe it’s because he needs to make sure Katara is okay. Maybe it’s something else, something he doesn’t even know.

All Zuko knows is that being here, caught in this place where he can see her but she can’t see him is absolute agony. 

He eventually realizes that he seems to be the only ghost around. He finds that odd. People die all the time. Shouldn’t there be more? Why is it just him? That leads him to more questions than he has answers for, and while he wants to find them, he can’t bring himself to leave Katara for long.

Every night she talks to the urn. She talks about how much she loves him and misses him, how she wishes he was here. When she goes back to work, she tells him about her days. Little does she know he follows her everywhere she goes.

She talks about their friends and his uncle. And Azula. Apparently, they’ve stayed in touch. Azula tells Katara about their childhood, things he’s never told her.

When she talks to him, he responds as if she can hear him. It’s almost like having a conversation with her again.

“I miss you.”

“I miss you too.”

“I know it’s real...you’re gone...but sometimes I just think you’ve gone away for a little while, and you’ll be back soon.”

“I’m sorry, love. I wish there was a way to tell you that I’m right here.”

“There’s so many things I want to tell you. Something will happen at work, and I’ll think, _I have to tell Zuko when I get home._ But you’re not...you’re gone.”

“I’m here, Katara.”

“And I just miss you so damn much...it hurts so bad. I don’t know how to live with this pain, Zuko.”

“You’re strong, Katara. You’re _so_ strong. You’re going to get through this. You’ll be okay.”

“I love you so much. We were supposed to be together for the rest of our lives.”

“I know, love. I know. But you’re going to be okay. You have your whole life ahead of you.”

“I still love you so much.”

“I love you too.”

* * *

More weeks pass. Zuko follows Katara through her days, from her shifts at the hospitals to the quiet evenings she spends in their apartment. Their friends come over often, more than they did even before Zuko died. 

Zuko’s glad. Katara needs their support, and he can tell she’s happier when they’re around. 

Zuko thinks Katara is dealing with his death in a healthy way for the most part. She talks about him, and her feelings. And she cries when she needs to. 

Some nights she sits in bed with a glass of wine, looking through the photo album she had made him for their anniversary last year. She cries then too, but Zuko sits beside her and talks to her about the memories each picture holds, even though she can’t hear him.

“Remember that? We went to the fair and you had your heart set on that giant stuffed octopus. I must’ve spent fifty bucks trying to win it before I finally did. You were so happy...I would do anything to make you smile like that again.”

He watches the tears sparkle in the hollows of her eyes and he longs to wipe them away. But he can’t, so he turns his focus on the next picture.

“What about this? Our first vacation after you finished college, before you started med school. The beach was so nice, wasn’t it?” 

It hurts him to look at those pictures, to remember those memories. To remember the feeling of her hand in his, the smell of her hair, the way he felt when she kissed him. Because he can’t have any of that now. He points to the next picture in the album as a bitter smile creases his face.

“But this...this is my favorite. Our first night in our apartment. Sokka almost fell down the stairs because he thought he could carry the TV by himself. Then we had to take the door off to get the couch through. Then when we were done, we all sat on the balcony and ate pizza off of napkins because you couldn’t find the plates…”

Zuko trails off as he thinks about the rest of the night. Katara had gone to take a shower after their friends left, and he’d hurried to set up candles and rose petals in their bedroom. The look on her face when she’d come into the room...Zuko had known at that moment that he wanted to be with her forever.

If only he’d known forever would be so short.

* * *

Two months after his death, Katara decides it’s time to go through his things. Zuko can’t say that it’s a bad thing, but it does hurt him to watch as she carefully takes his clothes out of the closet and puts them into a box to be donated.

All this time, she has left his things where they were the day he died. His coffee mug sits, clean and ready to be used, by the coffee pot. His toothbrush sits next to hers in the holder on the bathroom sink. His jacket and running shoes still remain by the door.

She holds herself together almost the entire time. But then she starts going through his sock drawer, and Zuko watches in nervous silence because he knows she’s going to find the thing he’d hidden there a few weeks before he died. And he knows when she finds it she’s going to fall apart all over again, and all he can do is watch, and he is _so_ sick of being unable to help her.

Katara finds it squirreled away in a pair of socks. She frowns as she feels something unusual, and unfolds them. The small box falls into her hands, and for a moment, all she does is stare at it. Then slowly, she lifts the lid and sees the delicate diamond ring nestled into its silk lining. 

Zuko’s heart breaks as he watches the tears well up in her eyes before they cascade down her cheeks. She drops to the ground, the box still in her hands, and she weeps, deep, broken sobs like those first few days after the shooting.

“No. No, no, no, no…” And then he hears her whisper between her sobs, “It’s not fair...it’s not fair…”

He goes to her and sits beside her on their bedroom floor, his arm wrapped around her, but not touching her, as he hangs his head and whispers soothing words she can’t hear.

“I love you so much, Katara. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry that I’m not here. I’m sorry you found the ring. But it’s okay, love. You’re going to be okay. You’re so young and beautiful and you have your _whole life_ ahead of you. You can still have a good life without me…”

He trails off and looks at her. He realizes that one day she _will_ find someone else. Someone she’ll smile at the way she used to smile at him, someone who she will bare her soul to, who will know how to make her laugh and all of her likes and dislikes. They will know her the way that _he_ does. 

And while he wants nothing more than for Katara to be happy, he’s bitter. He feels pain once again where his heart used to be, because her future happiness won’t be with him.

* * *

Zuko gets used to this strange existence. He doesn’t eat. He doesn’t sleep. But there are moments when he seems to pop out of existence, and he pops back in and realizes he’s lost time. Usually, it’s a few hours. But as time passes, it seems to become days. 

He can’t remember a thing. There’s just...nothingness. 

He wonders if that means he’s losing his connection to this world. If soon, he’ll pop out, and he won’t pop back in. Zuko doesn’t think he’s ready for that. He’s not ready to let Katara go, even as he tells her to let _him_ go.

But with the lapses of time growing longer, he clings to Katara when she’s there. Each night she talks to his urn, and he lays beside her in their bed, longing to touch her, to run his fingers through her hair and to press his lips against hers.

_What I’d give to have just one more day with her, one more day where I can touch her and tell her all of the things I never got to,_ Zuko thinks as she falls asleep.

He is a ghost. And it seems like sooner rather than later, he’ll be moving on to whatever comes after this place. He isn’t ready to go.

* * *

Six months after his death, Katara runs into the detective while she’s picking up dinner at Miyuki’s. Zuko is with her, invisible and unknown, and he sees the detective before Katara does. It’s sort of hard to forget the face of the man who told the love of your life that you were dead. 

But the detective remembers her, and he approaches her and strikes up a conversation. Zuko watches the exchange. It’s friendly enough. The detective expresses his condolences and asks her how she’s doing, and Katara gives him an honest answer: she’s doing okay, but it’s been hard.

The detective is sympathetic. He offers her his card again and tells her to call him if she ever needs anything. Katara accepts it with a grateful smile and tells him she will.

As he follows her home, Zuko hopes she sets the card someplace and forgets about it. He knows he wants her to be happy, but he’s selfish, too. He can’t stand the thought of seeing her with someone else. Can’t it wait until _after_ he blinks out of this world and into the next? He hopes that’s what the time lapses mean...and that she will wait until he’s truly gone.

* * *

  
  


It doesn’t happen that way.

Katara doesn’t call the detective. The detective stops by a month after their chance meeting at Miyuki’s. Katara is a little confused. Zuko wonders if there has been a development in the case, but that shouldn’t matter in regards to him. He was just a casualty of gang violence. 

But Detective Jet Lang does come with news about the case. The killer is going to trial. The true target is going to testify. The prosecution is hoping to get life in prison. He asks if she wants to go. He offers to stay with her if she does. Katara tells him she’ll think about it, and then the detective leaves.

“Don’t do that to yourself, love,” Zuko tells her once he’s gone. “You don’t have to sit through that. Please, don’t go.”

But Zuko knows Katara all too well. He can see it in the set of her jaw, the crease of her brow, the way she’s worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. She’s already made her decision.

* * *

As far as trials go, this one doesn’t take long. The evidence against the shooter is airtight, and the jury only deliberates for an hour before they hand down the guilty verdict. 

The prosecution brings Zuko up, paints him as the innocent bystander, a paramedic who devoted his life to helping others, and Zuko knows that seals the deal for the jury.

Detective Lang sits with Katara throughout the proceedings except for when he gets up to testify. She cries on his shoulder a few times, and he offers her the comfort Zuko has longed to give her. 

Afterwards, he takes her out for coffee. Zuko wonders if this is the start of something new for Katara, and the end of something for him.

* * *

Katara takes her time with the detective, and for that, Zuko is grateful. She takes three months of casual meetings for coffee or lunch before she invites him back to the apartment. 

Even though he’s always with her, Zuko is having a hard time figuring out if she’s interested in the detective or if she’s just looking for a friend. No matter which one it is, Zuko is trying to convince himself to be happy for her.

They order takeout from Miyuki’s and Zuko is a little bitter about that too, because that was _their_ place, their favorite restaurant. 

Zuko sits in the armchair while they eat Chinese food on the couch. The TV is on, playing some sequel to a movie that came out before he died, one he knows he wanted to see. But he can’t take his eyes off of Katara and the detective. 

They talk for hours. Jet tells her about why he became a cop. Katara tells him about her time in medical school and how she’s almost finished with her residency. She talks about Zuko too, about how kind and thoughtful he was, and how much she misses him. Jet is sympathetic, and he shares how he lost his parents when he was a young teenager, and Zuko can see the way it pulls at Katara’s heartstrings.

She’s always had a soft spot for broken things. That’s what drew her to Zuko. He had been a broken thing, and she had helped pick up all the pieces and make him whole again.

At the end of the night, Katara walks the detective to the door. She thanks him for being there for her, and he gives her a smile, and Zuko knows what that smile means, because he used to smile at her the same way. 

It means he’s falling in love with her.

The one year anniversary comes faster than Zuko thinks it could. Maybe it’s because his time lapses are becoming more frequent. 

But it does come, and Katara spends the day in the apartment. She watches his favorite movies and puts on his favorite songs. She wears one of his old t-shirts and brings the urn out of the bedroom. She lights incense and prays for him.

Their friends and his uncle come by later for dinner. They talk about Zuko. He stands close by and watches them. The sharp pain is gone, and what remains is the bittersweet recollections of his life, and the sad musings about what could have been, what _should_ have been.

Katara doesn’t tell them about the ring she found all those months ago. Zuko doesn’t think she ever has. But he knows she’s left it in the bedside table drawer, and sometimes even now she’ll open that box and take the ring out just to look at it. Sometimes, she even puts it on. She always cries when she does. 

One night, she had held it in the palm of her hand as tears fell down her cheeks and whispered out loud that she would have said yes. Regret had washed over him, but beneath that had been a sense of bittersweet joy. 

When they leave, she goes to their room, carrying his urn. She dresses for bed and slips under the covers. She takes the box out of the drawer and pulls out the ring. Then she talks to him.

“I’ve met someone, Zuko,” she says softly to the urn. “And he’s so sweet and kind.”

Zuko swallows hard. “I know, love.” 

“He wants to take care of me. I think he wants to be with me, but I’m afraid. I still miss you so much. Sometimes it hurts so bad. I’m afraid that I just want companionship. But you’ve been gone for a year now. I think I’ve finally come to accept it. I’ve been going to grief therapy and I’ve talked to her about Jet. She thinks that it’s okay for me to move on. That it’s normal, since I’m so young. But I don’t want to...to betray you.”

She’s trying hard not to cry, and Zuko can almost hear the lump in her throat.

“You won’t be, Katara,” Zuko says. He runs his fingers over her cheek. “I just want you to be happy.”

“He makes me happy,” she whispers.

Zuko closes his eyes. This is what he’s been wanting. This is what he’s been afraid of. 

He looks at her and he sees the life they built. He sees the memories and the hopes and the dreams, dashed and shattered by a bullet from a gun. She’s been grieving him for a year now. 

But in the hereafter, her life has continued while his came to a tragic stop. She doesn’t need to stay in limbo with him.

“So be happy,” he tells her softly.

And not for the first time, Zuko wishes he could cry.

* * *

She _is_ happy with the detective. Zuko can see it in the way her eyes sparkle when she laughs with him, in the way she touches his hand or shoulder or kisses his cheek. 

And he’s good to her too, _so_ good. He brings her flowers at work and takes her on dates. He surprises her with her favorite chocolates and says and does all of the right things. 

Zuko misses a lot of it as the time lapses get longer, and while it’s bittersweet, he finds he’s happy for her. And he’s ready to let go.

A year and a half after his passing, he stands over the bed where Katara and the detective lay sleeping. Jet has his arm around her, and she looks so peaceful. 

Zuko’s urn has found a new home on her dresser across the room.

“I love you so much, Katara,” he tells her softly. “And I can see that you’re happy now. You’re happy with Jet. And I know you’re going to be okay without me. I think...I think it’s time for me to go.”

He leans over her and lets his lips ghost over hers before he pulls back. He stares at her for a long moment, burning her face into his memory. He wants to hold onto her, wherever he goes next.

She opens her eyes, blinking sleepily, and seems to look right at him. Zuko holds his breath, wondering if she can really see him.

“Zuko?” Her voice is a shocked whisper.

His eyes widen. “You...you can see me?”

She sits up slowly. Behind her, the detective doesn’t stir. Katara gets out of bed and stands in front of him.

“You’re really here,” she breathes. 

“I’ve always been here,” he says quietly, and he offers her a smile. “I never left.” 

“All this time?” She’s staring at him. Zuko can’t say he blames her. “I’ve missed you so much.”

“I know, love.” 

Zuko reaches out for her, hoping maybe this time he can touch her. To his surprise, his fingers don’t pass through her skin. It’s not quite the same. He feels the warmth of her skin beneath his touch and it seems to buzz and vibrate through him. 

Katara closes her eyes and sighs. Then she seems to remember the detective sleeping behind her, as she glances at him from over her shoulder before she looks back at Zuko.

“I know he makes you happy, love,” Zuko murmurs. “You don’t have to feel guilty.”

She smiles gratefully at him. “Thank you.” She reaches out to him. Her fingers caress his cheek and he nuzzles into her touch. 

“I’ve missed this,” he murmurs. 

“Me too.” Katara looks at him with a soft smile as tears sparkle in her eyes.

“I think it’s time for me to go,” he says softly. He looks at Jet. “I think he’s going to take good care of you.”

“I think so too.” She reaches up to wipe her tears away. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too.”

He blinks.

_Pop._

Then he’s gone.


End file.
